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RMS addresses the free software community

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Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#381
Both MIT and Harvard have admitted to helping Jeffrey Epstein avoid prosecution on federal racketeering charges for the sex-trafficking of minors after they were exposed by whistle-blowers at both of these institutions. I'm still not sure why people consider it appropriate to exclude someone like Stallman from serving on the Board of the FSF while continuing to allow Mr. Rafael Reif, for example, to remain president of MIT after sending a personally signed "thank-you note" to one of the most notorious alleged sex-traffickers and convicted child-rapists in US history:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2020/01/12/after-epstei...

Nor would it be any more appropriate to allow Mr. Seth Lloyd back onto the MIT campus with just a slap on the wrist:

https://thetech.com/2021/02/25/mit-administration-epstein-op...

Or Mr. Martin Nowak for that matter either:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/03/26/metro/harvard-sanctio...

This hacker news thread on Nowak is worth reading again:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25442060

So why has nobody drafted petitions to cancel Rafael "Thank You So Much Mr. Epstein -- And Don't Forget to Show My Letter to Federal Prosecutors" Reif, Benedict "Epstein is an Ideal Donor for Harvard" Gross, Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz, Martin "Punishment Serves No Noble Purpose" Nowak, Steven "Using the Internet to Entice a Minor into Prostition is A-Okay" Pinker, Seth "So What If I Make Female Undergraduates at MIT Feel Uncomfortable "Lloyd, Neri "Epstein was Always a Reliable Supporter of Israel" Oxman, Frank "I Never Saw any Girls that were Underage" Wilczek, and all of the other pedophilia-tolerating two-faced phonies that attended EDGE Foundation dinners hosted by the convicted child rapist and/or visited him on "Pedophile Isle," where FBI reportedly found instruction manuals that Mr. Epstein had ordered on Amazon that describe how to create a so-called "sex slave," in addition to video tapes containing child pornography that he allegedly recorded using secret cameras that were installed throughout his various residences?

Stallman blaming his "being on the spectrum" for all of the troubling statements cataloged on the website cited below may not entirely excuse Mr. Stallman for making them since there is no evidence that someone on the spectrum is more likely than the general population to hold similar views on child rape:

https://geekfeminism.wikia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman

But the most important question today that Mr. Stallman needs to address directly, because many of his critics on this issue continue to hold him in the highest regard for his role in advancing the free software movement, is a very frank one:

Were his remarks in support of pedophilia designed to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation, much like he observed role-models such as MIT president Rafael Reif do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Reif sent Mr. Epstein a personally signed thank-you note for his donation to the Media Lab, or colleagues like Martin Nowak do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Nowak created a web page on a university website and an office in his department for a convicted child-rapist in exchange for tens of millions of dollars in donations that were promised to his academic program at Harvard and hundreds of millions of dollars in donations, often laundered through Epstein's fellow billionaire pedophile friends like Les Wexner, Glenn Dubin, and Leon Black, to Harvard University, where Mr. Nowak is a professor?

I'm not entirely convinced by the naysayers on this one yet, but Stallman is most deserving of forgiveness thus far, and not because of his autism, but rather because of all of his contributions to free software in spite of it.

Some of the other co-conspirators cited above deserve to spend time in the same jail cell where Epstein killed himself because he was too much of a coward to stand trial for all of the crimes that he knew he had committed.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#382
post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>On technical matters, you are correct; on moral matters it's a different story. They are intertwined. His moral positions have done incredible damage to GCC at a technical level, and lost huge amounts of marketshare to LLVM as a direct result. (Stallman thought that making the compiler more modular and extensible was totally unacceptable because it might be possible in theory to write proprietary tools that used GCC…

> His moral positions have done incredible damage to GCC at a technical level, and lost huge amounts of marketshare to LLVM as a direct result. We can take this as a given for the purposes of the discussion. > They are intertwined But which has priority? The main issue with this topic is that it's sometimes hard to see things from an angle we're so unaccustomed to. The FSF and the GNU project are accidentally technic…

>The goal is not market share

Market share is absolutely a goal, even if it's only a part of the broader goal. GCC used to have significant leverage to advance free software, and now they have almost none.

>From the FSF's point of view loss of market share is an acceptable loss, if the alternative is "be evil". That is why, odd as it may seem, the FSF needs someone who does not compromise on that.

But it's not. Go look through some of the mailing list threads about LLVM, the whining is nearly unbearable. Despite LLVM having been offered to GNU in the mid 2000s (yes the whole thing, even extending to copyright assignment) and GNU having turned it down due largely to their opposition to modularity.

https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2015-02/msg00...

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Neither of those things will happen. We would be better off if we could remove those dishonest people from our communities here and elsewhere. Dishonest reporting, and amplifying of dishonest posts on social media is not something you will ever get an apology for, because those efforts were never meant to survive scrutiny. They were meant to create "pressure" to cause reputational damage. You cannot convince or engag…

> Dishonest reporting, and amplifying of dishonest posts on social media is not something you will ever get an apology for, because those efforts were never meant to survive scrutiny. They were meant to create "pressure" to cause reputational damage. Exactly. The correct way of handling these instances of bad behavior is to block, shadowban and ignore.

I think mockery is better than blocking. Many of the people involved have convinced each other they have the moral high ground.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#384
Both MIT and Harvard have admitted to helping Jeffrey Epstein avoid prosecution on federal racketeering charges for the sex-trafficking of minors after they were exposed by whistle-blowers at both of these institutions. I'm still not sure why people consider it appropriate to exclude someone like Stallman from serving on the Board of the FSF while continuing to allow Mr. Rafael Reif, for example, to remain president of MIT after sending a personally signed "thank-you note" to one of the most notorious alleged sex-traffickers and convicted child-rapists in US history: https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2020/01/12/after-epstei...

Nor would it be any more appropriate to allow Mr. Seth Lloyd back onto the MIT campus with just a slap on the wrist:

https://thetech.com/2021/02/25/mit-administration-epstein-op...

Or Mr. Martin Nowak for that matter either:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/03/26/metro/harvard-sanctio...

This hacker news thread on Nowak is worth reading again:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25442060

So why has nobody drafted petitions to cancel Rafael "Thank You So Much Mr. Epstein -- And Don't Forget to Show My Letter to Federal Prosecutors" Reif, Benedict "Epstein is an Ideal Donor for Harvard" Gross, Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz, Martin "Punishment Serves No Noble Purpose" Nowak, Steven "Using the Internet to Entice a Minor into Prostition is A-Okay" Pinker, Seth "So What If I Make Female Undergraduates at MIT Feel Uncomfortable "Lloyd, Neri "Epstein was Always a Reliable Supporter of Israel" Oxman, Frank "I Never Saw any Girls that were Underage" Wilczek, and all of the other pedophilia-tolerating two-faced phonies that attended EDGE Foundation dinners hosted by the convicted child rapist and/or visited him on "Pedophile Isle," where FBI reportedly found instruction manuals that Mr. Epstein had ordered on Amazon that describe how to create a so-called "sex slave," in addition to video tapes containing child pornography that he allegedly recorded using secret cameras that were installed throughout his various residences?

Stallman blaming his "being on the spectrum" for all of the troubling statements cataloged on the website cited below may not entirely excuse Mr. Stallman for making them since there is no evidence that someone on the spectrum is more likely than the general population to hold similar views on child rape:

https://geekfeminism.wikia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman

But the most important question today that Mr. Stallman needs to address directly, because many of his critics on this issue continue to hold him in the highest regard for his role in advancing the free software movement, is a very frank one:

Were his remarks in support of pedophilia designed to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation, much like he observed role-models such as MIT president Rafael Reif do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Reif sent Mr. Epstein a personally signed thank-you note for his donation to the Media Lab, or colleagues like Martin Nowak do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Nowak created a web page on a university website and an office in his department for a convicted child-rapist in exchange for tens of millions of dollars in donations that were promised to his academic program at Harvard and hundreds of millions of dollars in donations, often laundered through Epstein's fellow billionaire pedophile friends like Les Wexner, Glenn Dubin, and Leon Black, to Harvard University, where Mr. Nowak is a professor?

I'm not entirely convinced by the naysayers on this one yet, but Stallman is most deserving of forgiveness thus far, and not because of his autism, but rather because of all of his contributions to free software in spite of it.

Some of the other co-conspirators cited above deserve to spend time in the same jail cell where Epstein killed himself because he was too much of a coward to stand trial for all of the crimes that he knew he had committed.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#385
post #49

The Minsky defense was not the primary, most important reason RMS can't serve as an effective, inclusive leader for free software, it was just the one that got the most attention. This does nothing to address the numerous complaints of harassment towards MIT students, the _other_ times he spoke out in implicit support of pedophilia, the public gaffes that are unacceptable as a public representative (e.g. the foot ski…

>and the fact that the FSF under Stallman kinda lost to open source anyway and hasn't really done anything What can the FSF do better, with or without RMS ? I honestly don't think there are too many good solutions. The parts that matter to FSF (i.e., free software at the hardware layer), are also the most challenging and for which there are no business incentives, political awareness, or will. Otherwise, garden varie…

[deleted]

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#386
While I support RMS and find the lies peddled about him abhorrent, this article convinced me he is not fit to serve as the public face of free software: http://ebb.org/bkuhn/blog/2019/10/15/fsf-rms.html

In short: He harmed the cause of free software by making public statements on unrelated, controversial issues.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#387
post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is alleging Minsky was never approached by Guiffre as directed. But there are also no claim in evidence that Guiffre actually had sex with him. You keep claiming an accusation that you have no evidence of.

The deposition is the claim. They were discussing men Guiffre had been trafficked to. You're deliberately ignoring that.

No, I'm not ignoring that. I'm pointing it out does not say what you claim it says.

It could imply it, but it does not say it.

It makes the claim she was trafficked. That is supported by the deposition. That is supported by the witness you mention. There is no reason to doubt that.

But trafficking does not contain an automatic implication sex happened in every instance. What matters to establish trafficking is Maxwell's purpose in sending her, not whether or not the purpose was fulfilled.

What you choose to believe is one thing, but your claim there is an accusation sex occurred in this specific case is not supported by that statement no matter how much you choose to read into it.

You're deliberately ignoring the plain wording of the questions and Guiffres own answers, and instead read into them what you want them to say.

Maybe Guiffre meant to make a direct accusation [against nst Minsky, anyway], but she did not in that deposition.

EDIT: You'll note I'm not at all claiming Minsky didn't have sex with her. I don't know if he did. It's possible he did. Still associating with Epstein at that point in time already stinks and it is reasonable to wonder why. It's possible Guiffres intent was to accuse him. A whole lot of things are possible. But what is possible and what accusations there are evidence for are different things.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#388
oth MIT and Harvard have admitted to helping Jeffrey Epstein avoid prosecution on federal racketeering charges for the sex-trafficking of minors after they were exposed by whistle-blowers at both of these institutions. I'm still not sure why people consider it appropriate to exclude someone like Stallman from serving on the Board of the FSF while continuing to allow Mr. Rafael Reif, for example, to remain president of MIT after sending a personally signed "thank-you note" to one of the most notorious alleged sex-traffickers and convicted child-rapists in US history:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2020/01/12/after-epstei...

Nor would it be any more appropriate to allow Mr. Seth Lloyd back onto the MIT campus with just a slap on the wrist:

https://thetech.com/2021/02/25/mit-administration-epstein-op...

Or Mr. Martin Nowak for that matter either:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/03/26/metro/harvard-sanctio...

This hacker news thread on Nowak is worth reading again:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25442060

So why has nobody drafted petitions to cancel Rafael "Thank You So Much Mr. Epstein -- And Don't Forget to Show My Letter to Federal Prosecutors" Reif, Benedict "Epstein is an Ideal Donor for Harvard" Gross, Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz, Martin "Punishment Serves No Noble Purpose" Nowak, Steven "Using the Internet to Entice a Minor into Prostition is A-Okay" Pinker, Seth "So What If I Make Female Undergraduates at MIT Feel Uncomfortable "Lloyd, Neri "Epstein was Always a Reliable Supporter of Israel" Oxman, Frank "I Never Saw any Girls that were Underage" Wilczek, and all of the other pedophilia-tolerating two-faced phonies that attended EDGE Foundation dinners hosted by the convicted child rapist and/or visited him on "Pedophile Isle," where FBI reportedly found instruction manuals that Mr. Epstein had ordered on Amazon that describe how to create a so-called "sex slave," in addition to video tapes containing child pornography that he allegedly recorded using secret cameras that were installed throughout his various residences?

Stallman blaming his "being on the spectrum" for all of the troubling statements cataloged on the website cited below may not entirely excuse Mr. Stallman for making them since there is no evidence that someone on the spectrum is more likely than the general population to hold similar views on child rape:

https://geekfeminism.wikia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman

But the most important question today that Mr. Stallman needs to address directly, because many of his critics on this issue continue to hold him in the highest regard for his role in advancing the free software movement, is a very frank one:

Were his remarks in support of pedophilia designed to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation, much like he observed role-models such as MIT president Rafael Reif do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Reif sent Mr. Epstein a personally signed thank-you note for his donation to the Media Lab, or colleagues like Martin Nowak do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Nowak created a web page on a university website and an office in his department for a convicted child-rapist in exchange for tens of millions of dollars in donations that were promised to his academic program at Harvard and hundreds of millions of dollars in donations, often laundered through Epstein's fellow billionaire pedophile friends like Les Wexner, Glenn Dubin, and Leon Black, to Harvard University, where Mr. Nowak is a professor?

I'm not entirely convinced by the naysayers on this one yet, but Stallman is most deserving of forgiveness thus far, and not because of his autism, but rather because of all of his contributions to free software in spite of it.

Some of the other co-conspirators cited above deserve to spend time in the same jail cell where Epstein killed himself because he was too much of a coward to stand trial for all of the crimes that he knew he had committed.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#389
Both MIT and Harvard have admitted to helping Jeffrey Epstein avoid prosecution on federal racketeering charges for the sex-trafficking of minors after they were exposed by whistle-blowers at both of these institutions. I'm still not sure why people consider it appropriate to exclude someone like Stallman from serving on the Board of the FSF while continuing to allow Mr. Rafael Reif, for example, to remain president of MIT after sending a personally signed "thank-you note" to one of the most notorious alleged sex-traffickers and convicted child-rapists in US history: https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2020/01/12/after-epstei...

Nor would it be any more appropriate to allow Mr. Seth Lloyd back onto the MIT campus with just a slap on the wrist:

https://thetech.com/2021/02/25/mit-administration-epstein-op...

Or Mr. Martin Nowak for that matter either:

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/03/26/metro/harvard-sanctio...

This hacker news thread on Nowak is worth reading again:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25442060

So why has nobody drafted petitions to cancel Rafael "Thank You So Much Mr. Epstein -- And Don't Forget to Show My Letter to Federal Prosecutors" Reif, Benedict "Epstein is an Ideal Donor for Harvard" Gross, Alan "Dershbag" Dershowitz, Martin "Punishment Serves No Noble Purpose" Nowak, Steven "Using the Internet to Entice a Minor into Prostition is A-Okay" Pinker, Seth "So What If I Make Female Undergraduates at MIT Feel Uncomfortable "Lloyd, Neri "Epstein was Always a Reliable Supporter of Israel" Oxman, Frank "I Never Saw any Girls that were Underage" Wilczek, and all of the other pedophilia-tolerating two-faced phonies that attended EDGE Foundation dinners hosted by the convicted child rapist and/or visited him on "Pedophile Isle," where FBI reportedly found instruction manuals that Mr. Epstein had ordered on Amazon that describe how to create a so-called "sex slave," in addition to video tapes containing child pornography that he allegedly recorded using secret cameras that were installed throughout his various residences?

Stallman blaming his "being on the spectrum" for all of the troubling statements cataloged on the website cited below may not entirely excuse Mr. Stallman for making them since there is no evidence that someone on the spectrum is more likely than the general population to hold similar views on child rape:

https://geekfeminism.wikia.org/wiki/Richard_Stallman

But the most important question today that Mr. Stallman needs to address directly, because many of his critics on this issue continue to hold him in the highest regard for his role in advancing the free software movement, is a very frank one:

Were his remarks in support of pedophilia designed to persuade Mr. Epstein to donate part of his $500 million estate to the Free Software Foundation, much like he observed role-models such as MIT president Rafael Reif do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Reif sent Mr. Epstein a personally signed thank-you note for his donation to the Media Lab, or colleagues like Martin Nowak do for Mr. Epstein when Dr. Nowak created a web page on a university website and an office in his department for a convicted child-rapist in exchange for tens of millions of dollars in donations that were promised to his academic program at Harvard and hundreds of millions of dollars in donations, often laundered through Epstein's fellow billionaire pedophile friends like Les Wexner, Glenn Dubin, and Leon Black, to Harvard University, where Mr. Nowak is a professor?

I'm not entirely convinced by the naysayers on this one yet, but Stallman is most deserving of forgiveness thus far, and not because of his autism, but rather because of all of his contributions to free software in spite of it.

Some of the other co-conspirators cited above deserve to spend time in the same jail cell where Epstein killed himself because he was too much of a coward to stand trial for all of the crimes that he knew he had committed.

Re: RMS addresses the free software community

#390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to mention how badly he mismanaged the paid staff of the FSF which prompted them to unionize: https://twitter.com/paulnivin/status/1377079987950395393 I think, if anything, this is the strongest argument for why he should not be in a leadership position at the FSF.

This appears to be about events that are at least 15 years old, if not older? Does sound like a pretty terrible manager. An unpaid volunteer position on the board doesn’t really seem like the position where these problems would happen again. And they weren’t the reason he got in hot water - that was all related to a media firestorm over Minsky/Epstein.

> This appears to be about events that are at least 15 years old, if not older?

What would you consider an appropriate statute of limitations here?

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